Stuffed Acorn Squash with Kale and Chick Peas

Acorn squash is great, because it’s like a bowl! It’s nice and round, unlike its cousins delicata and butternut. So it’s often stuffed. Here, I stuffed the squash with kale and chick peas, along with a little bit of homemade tomato sauce.

Obviously, you can use jarred marinara or even just canned sauce, but I happened to have some leftover homemade stuff hanging out in my fridge from the pizza I made earlier this week. You can probably even use vegetable broth or chicken stock (hold the cheese!).

Actually, at first I thought of making this recipe meat and adding some sausages into the stuffing, but then I decided that I’d rather make a crispy cheesy topping. Next time, I’m going to try the meat version (Jessica made one a while back, for one of our link ups!). Sausage, kale, no chick peas, chicken stock instead of tomato sauce… mmm, must experiment before spring comes back!

Stuffed Acorn Squash with Kale and Chick Peas
Serves 4

Ingredients:

2 acorn squashes

olive oil

1 leek, chopped

1 clove garlic, chopped

1 bunch of kale, chopped

1 cup tomato sauce

1 can of chick peas, drained

salt and pepper

1/2 cup panko breadcrumbs

1/4 cup grated parmesan cheese

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees. Cut the squashes in half lengthwise and scoop out the seeds. Drizzle with olive oil and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Bake cut-side-up on a sheet pan for about 20 minutes, until you can stab it with a fork. Remove from oven, turn over and bake for another 5 minutes.

Meanwhile, heat a drizzle of olive oil in a pan. Cook the leeks for about 5 minutes. Add the garlic, cook another 2 minutes, until soft and fragrant.

Add the kale to the pan. Season and mix. Cover and cook until the kale is wilted.

Meanwhile, mix together the panko and parmesan cheese. Set aside.

Add the chick peas to the kale and mix well.

By now the squash should be ready. Remove from oven and stuff the kale mixture into the scooped out part of the squash. Divide evenly between the four halves.

Set tour oven to broil.

Top the stuffed squash with the panko mixture. Broil for 2 minutes, until the top is a crisp golden brown.